Westfield Group (ASX:WDC)  is the largest retail property group in the world by equity market capitalisation. It has investment interests in 126 shopping centres in Australia, New Zealand and the United States

Westfield, which is among the blue chip stocks, revealed a full year 2011 profit of $1.53 billion, a 37.5% rise on the previous corresponding period, slightly ahead of analyst expectations.

Full year revenue climbed 10.5% to $1.46 billion, year on year.

WDC declared a final distribution of 24.2 cents, in line with expectations.

The group also announced it would start an on-market buyback of securities for up to 10% of its issued capital.

To Access FREE Daily Trading Recommendations, Click Here!

Woolworths (ASX:WOW) operates supermarkets, specialty and discount department stores, liquor and electronics stores throughout Australia. Woolworths also manufactures processed foods, exports and wholesales food and offers petrol retailing.  The Company also operates hotels which includes pubs, food, accommodation, and gaming operations.

ASX Blue chip supermarket giant Woolworths today announced 2Q sales growth of 5.1% to $14.1 billion compared to the previous corresponding quarter, this was in line with market expectations.

The 2Q sales results bought the 1H FY12 sales to $29.7 billion, a 5% increase on the previous year.

WOW also announced that it will sell its Dick Smith consumer electronics business following a strategic review that was announced in November.

Since the review the company said it has received a number of unsolicited approaches in relation to Dick Smith.

Receive FREE Daily Trading Recommendations, Click Here

BHP Billiton (ASX:BHP) is an international resources company.  The Company’s principal business lines are mineral exploration and production, including coal, iron ore, gold, titanium, ferroalloys, nickel and copper concentrate, as well as petroleum exploration, production, and refining.

Blue chip stock BHP, today announced that its latest quarterly iron ore output increased 22% in the December quarter compared to the previous quarter.

BHP’s operations in Western Australia’s Pilbara region recorded record production on an annualized basis, as the company expanded its infrastructure base in the area.

The Melbourne based company said that it expects full-year production to marginally exceed prior guidance of 159 million tons per annum.

Click to Receive FREE Trading Recommendations!

Westpac Banking Corporation (ASX:WBC) is Australia’s oldest bank operating a significant banking franchise in Australia and New Zealand.  WBC is considered an ASX Blue Chip Share. The company has balanced exposures to retail, corporate and institutional sectors.

Westpac has been one of the more acquisitive banks domestically with successful takeovers of Bank of Melbourne and Challenge Bank and Trust Bank in New Zealand. More recently WBC has aggressively expanded its wealth management activities with the acquisition of Rothschild Australia Asset Management, BT Funds Management and Hastings Funds Management.

Westpac today held their AGM where it warned that the European debt crisis will continue to impact the price and possibly the availably of funding to Australia’s banking sector.

CEO Mrs Gail Kelly said the outlook for the global economic outlook remained mixed with Australia not immune to these headwinds, with growth slowing and consumer and business spending cautious.

Mrs Kelly also hinted that WBC may not pass on future interest rate cuts to borrowers in full, citing the impact of higher funding costs on interest rate margins.

Click to Receive FREE Daily Trading Recommendations!

Westfield Group (ASX:WDC)  is the largest retail property group in the world by equity market capitalisation. It has investment interests in 126 shopping centres in Australia, New Zealand and the United States.

Westfield, which is among the blue chip stocks, has released its 3^rd quarter operating update for the nine months to 30 September 2011.

WDC reaffirmed its full year earnings forecast, saying it is seeing growth in all of its markets.

Current full year forecast for distribution per security is 48.4 cents, whilst operational segment earnings are expected to be 74.6 cents per security.

Westfield did outline their new development projects for the next few years with $1.25 Billion to be spent in 2012 and a further $1.5 Billion in 2013.

Receive FREE Trading Recommendations for 7 Days, Click Now!

Wesfarmers (ASX:WES) is Australia’s leading conglomerate, headquartered in Perth, Western Australia.  It is also widely considered among the market’s blue chip stocks.

The company owns several iconic Australian businesses, including supermarket chain Coles, hardware retailer Bunning’s Warehouse, discount department stores Target and K-Mart, and office supplies provider Officeworks. WES also involves in industrials supplies distribution, coal mining, fertilisers, chemicals and general insurance.

Today, WES announced that it has sold its Premier coal mine to Chinese-based Yancoal, for $296.8 million.

The deal needs approval from Australian and Chinese regulators, and WES said that the sale would generate an additional $90 million in pre-tax profit.

Receive FREE Trading Recommendations for the next 7 Days, Click Here!

Rio Tinto (ASX:RIO) is one of the world’s largest miners, mining and processing a wide range of metals and minerals including all the key base metals, precious metals, diamonds, iron ore and energy products.

The company is one of the biggest on the Australian share market and is widely considered among the blue chip stocks.

Today RIO said it will invest US$833 million to upgrade its integrated power and gas network, and develop fuel supply projects, in the Pilbara region.

The projects will be required to support RIO’s targeted annual production capacity of 283 million tonnes by 2013.

Receive FREE Trading Recommendations for the next 7 Days, Click Here!

UGL Limited (ASX:UGL) is an engineering and services company providing industrial maintenance, manufacturing, engineering, transport facilities management and corporate real estate services to blue chip companies and governments across the world.

The company has grown aggressively over the past decade via acquisitions and expansion in the engineering and industrial services sectors.

Owing to its diversification into the rail, infrastructure, resources and services sectors, UGL has continued to win major projects across the board.

Contracts picking up

UGL has agreed to new works and contract extensions worth a combined $400 million.

The company’s contracts include new long term maintenance agreements with heavyweights such as BHP Billiton (ASX:BHP) and Coal Allied (ASX:CNA).

Similar contracts have also been concluded for alumina and fuel refineries.

UGL said it continues to experience positive trading conditions across its resources business.

Click for Daily Blue Chip Shares Advice

Woodside Petroleum is Australia’s leading oil and gas exploration company, and is 24% owned by global energy giant Shell Australia.

The company sells natual gas, liquefied natural gas (LNG), crude oil, condensate and liquid petroleum gas (LPG) globally. WPL is considered one the markets blue chip shares.

WPL produces the equivalent of around 65 million barrels of oil a year, much of it from the lucrative North-West Shelf area off the WA coast – the largest LNG field in the country.

The company has significant growth prospects through its Pluto, Browse and Sunrise projects.

Last week Woodside provided an update on its Pluto project, revealing a delay and cost blowout at Pluto.

The shock six-month delay and additional $900 million cost overrun to $14.9 billion for the project saw WPL get smashed.

This pushes gas shipments to Japan from September this year to March 2012.

WPL says the delay has been caused by seven weeks of bad weather and slower than expected progress on the commissioning of the onshore LNG plant.

WPL shares finished Friday’s session down 3.8%.

Click here for FREE Daily Stock Picks

News Corp (NWS) is a diversified media conglomerate with interests all over the world and in most facets of media.

NWS thus has a wide range of household name services and assets under its belt, including Fox Filmed Entertainment, Twentieth Century Fox Television, Fox Sports, book publisher Harper Collins, the New York Post in the US, web services Photobucket and MySpace, and Dow Jones.

The group is also considered a blue chip stock among global investors and is one of the biggest companies in the Australian share market.

Last week, NWS advised that third quarter net profit fell 24% from a year earlier to $639 million.  The profit result missed analyst estimates.

The result came on the back of a 6% decrease in revenue, which NWSattributed to weakness in its filmed entertainment and publishing divisions.

However, the cable division was a bright spot, with operating earnings rising 25% on-year amid stronger advertising revenue.

Click for more FREE Shares Advice.